Middle East

Each year, Ethical Traveler reviews the policies and practices of the world’s developing nations, then selects the ten that are doing the best job of preserving their environment, promoting human rights and creating a sustainable, community-based tourism industry.

| A Green Revolution | Come to Beirut. Come for more than 5,000 years of history—even more when you include the ancient city of Byblos (an area known today as Jubayl), home to the seafaring Phoenicians and perhaps the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world. Come for the more recent French colonial heritage, impressive […]

| Green Adventure Touring | Why go to Lebanon? Let’s start with the spirit and optimism of the Lebanese, despite a recent history that’s horrible beyond imagining. Or Lebanon’s seven millenia of history. Then there’s its fantastic street food, from silken hummus drizzled in rich olive oil to tangy stuffed grape leaves. And the renaissance […]

| Luxury Fit For a Green Sheikh | The towering skyscrapers of Dubai disappear behind me in a haze. The air smells and tastes of sand, even as the taxi whisks past a new cricket field whose emerald turf is in shocking contrast to the dun surroundings. We have far to go, and we’re flying […]

| The City-State Story | I’m in Dubai, or at least that’s what my brain on red-eye time says. Even sleep starved, I can see that this airport where I now find myself—in the United Arab Emirates’ city-state version of Las Vegas—is swank beyond belief. Flashes of men in elegant white kandura robes, guthra headscarves […]

Over the past year, hotel chains in the Middle East have gone from small steps toward sustainability to great strides. Jordan Valley Marriott Dead Sea, for example, saved 67 percent on diesel bills within just one week of switching to solar energy.